


for every bird there is a stone

by lacking



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Season/Series 01 Finale, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Shiro (Voltron)-centric, Sickfic, Team Dynamics, Team as Family, but everyone else still gets their time to shine
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-09
Updated: 2017-01-24
Packaged: 2018-08-07 14:48:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7718974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lacking/pseuds/lacking
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Shiro walks away from his confrontation with Haggar injured and shaken. After falling through the corrupted wormhole and finding himself stranded alongside Keith on a solitary planet, Shiro begins doubting his bond with the black lion and his place among the other paladins. As the team is reunited and his health continues to decline, Shiro is forced to confront parts of himself he thought were long buried, and everyone is left questioning just how far he’s willing to go in order to survive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Shiro wakes up coughing, with blood hot in his throat and his teeth scraping over his tongue as he’s jostled in his seat, the black lion rattling around him as they fall. The white flash of the view screen stings at his eyes when he lifts his head, and he can’t orient himself beyond the howl of the warning alarms, the dull pulse of pain stinging at the inside of his cheek, curling along his abdomen like claws, hooked deep and _pulling._

“Shiro! Hey!” A weak voice filters over the comms, almost drowned out by the shriek of the sirens, the ringing in Shiro’s ears. “Answer me!”

“Keith?”

Static crackles through the speaker, and it’s too easy for Shiro to picture Keith rolling his eyes, ducking his head to huff out an annoyed sigh against his collar.

“Yes, Keith! Pull up before you kill us both!”

Shiro swallows, his saliva coppery and thick, gummy in his mouth. He shakes his head, blinks until his eyes agree to focus, and it takes a moment for his vision to clear, for him to comprehend that the massive expanse of white displayed on screen isn’t a glitch, but the snow-covered tundra he’s hurtling towards.

He’s carrying Keith again, the red lion caught in the black lion’s jaws, weighing her down. Shiro remembers plummeting through the side of the wormhole, of crashing into the red lion and latching on. They were thrown about together, Keith yelling something over comms that Shiro couldn’t catch, his vision darkening as they were flung through space, end over end.

Shiro yanks back on the controls, pressing hard into his seat as he urges the black lion to rise. There’s a whining in his ears, a buzzing sensation that rushes over his skin and settles in his fingertips, the ones still made of flesh and bone. He reaches out to his lion, trying to recall the calm certainty he felt while free falling over Arus, the sense of something greater than himself stirring, stretching back to meet him halfway. 

“Shiro!” Keith shouts, panic in his voice, and the black lion offers nothing but cold silence.

“Brace yourself,” Shiro warns, and Keith’s reply is swallowed up by the scrape of ice on metal as the black lion’s feet skid against he frozen ground. Shiro bows his head and tightens his grip, tries to keep his lion steady even as the impact shudders through his arms. For a moment he almost thinks he’ll succeed, but something catches against the red lion’s paw, a hunk of ice or massive bolder, and Shiro is thrown forward in his seat, the break in his armour cracking against the edge of the control panel.

Shiro chokes, his breath leaving him in a rush as pain flares along his side. He’s not sure if he jerks the controls or if it’s the obstruction that knocks the black lion off balance, but whatever the reason both lions are left hurtling off course, tipping over and skidding on their sides across the ice and snow, spinning away from each other as they slowly drag to a stop.

Shiro is left gasping, hunched over with a sick taste splashing at the back of his tongue. His head spins as he guides his lion into an upright position, bracing his feet against the floor, trying to steady himself as the world tips back into place.

“Keith?” Shiro croaks. “You all right, buddy?”

“Y—” Keith cuts himself off, muttering something beneath his breath as a clunking sound filters across the comms. “I’m fine. Did you pass out?”

“Yeah. Anyone else come through with us?”

“Not that I can tell. You getting a read on anything? Any chatter?”

“Nothing.” Shiro brings up the alternate control screen with a quick flick of his wrist, squinting at the readout. “How’s the red lion?”

“Not responding. There’s power, but—” a faint clicking sounds over the comms. Shiro can only assume Keith is hauling at the controls, a firm scowl set in place. 

“Hey, go easy over there,” Shiro says. “Don’t try to force anything. Pidge and Hunk can take a look when we get back.”

“That’s all you have to say?” Keith asks, tone clipped, suddenly sharp. 

Shiro doesn’t take the bait. “What else should I be saying?”

“Coran told me not to go after Zarkon,” Keith says, still pushing. “I didn’t listen.”

The corner of Shiro’s mouth twitches. He presses a hand over the crack in his armour, loose pieces shifting beneath his fingers, dragging against the thin soft-suit he’s wearing underneath. He clenches his teeth, a sharp hiss of air escaping between them as something throbs and pulls too far, tearing. 

“You sound angry enough for the both of us,” he says, hoping that Keith can’t hear the waver in his voice. “Besides, I’m not sure I’m in the best position right now to lecture someone else about their poor choices. Can you make it over here?”

More vague sounds flood the black lion’s cockpit. Keith moving around, maybe. “Just give me a minute to gather up some supplies.”

“Those supplies include a med-kit?”

“They… can.” A beat of silence. “You’re hurt?”

Shiro pulls in a slow breath. He lifts his hand, and his palm peels away from the break in his armour, slick and red. 

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I’m hurt.”

 

\--

 

Shiro decides against taking off his armour until Keith has made it over safely, and he’s glad that he does. The moment the hatch opens a gust of snow and sleet rush inside, the wind so cold that it burns against the bare skin of Shiro’s jaw. Keith hurries forward, hunched over against the squall, a supply bag clutched tight against his chest. 

“I’ll have to make another trip,” Keith says, the faceplate of his helmet retracting as he hauls himself into the black lion’s cockpit. “Couldn’t bring over all of the rations. What happened?”

“Had a run in with Zarkon’s witch,” Shiro says ( _Haggar,_ a voice whispers in the back of his head. _Her name is Haggar. You know it is_ ). 

He turns so Keith can see the damage for himself, trying to keep his expression neutral, sheepish, like this is more embarrassing for him than anything else.

Keith doesn’t seem to buy the act, his eyes narrowing, brows pulling inwards.

“There’s blood on your face,” Keith tells him, knuckling the corner of his own mouth when Shiro blinks in response.

“I bit my tongue.”

“Right.”

“I’d tell you if I was coughing up blood, Keith.”

Shiro pulls off his helmet and unclips his gloves, but needs Keith’s help in taking off his chest plate, the wound at his side pulling when he tries to lift his arm too high. He’s already bled through his soft-suit, the stain spreading out over his hip and stomach, stretching down towards his thigh.

Keith goes still at the sight, his face drawn and pale.

“Probably looks worse than it is,” Shiro says, peeling back the top portion of his suit, rolling it up towards his chest to get a better look. 

There are three gouges running along the curve of Shiro’s waist, the lowest resting just above the jut of his hip. The edge of each cut looks tattered, like a torn strip of paper, and the surrounding skin is dark and bruised. Shiro squints, thinks he can see a thin, spider-web like pattern branching out from the wound beneath his skin, spreading out and across his abdomen.

“I don’t know,” Keith says, crossing his arms. “Looks pretty bad to me.”

“You’re picking up on Lance’s attitude, you know that, right?”

“I am _not_ —”

“Can you stitch it?” Shiro asks. “I think the angle’s a bit awkward for me.”

The edges of Keith’s mouth tighten. 

“Shiro—”

“We can’t do anything more about it now. Not until we get back to the castle.”

“I know, I just— I’ve never done that before.”

“First time for everything,” Shiro says, feigning a lightness he doesn’t feel. 

Keith still looks unsure, so Shiro knocks the heel of his hand against his shoulder, putting just enough force behind the blow to make him sway where he stands. 

“Come on, kiddo. I know you can do it.”

Keith scowls. “Don’t call me that. I hate that.”

“I remember,” Shiro says, smiling a little at the look it earns him.

They pool their resources, picking through the combined contents of their med-kits, putting aside as much as possible. Keith deciphers whatever it is the Altean’s use for anesthetic mostly by process of elimination, cracking open the container’s seal with a quick twist of his hand. The sharp, clean scent of it turns Shiro’s stomach, makes his throat tighten. For a moment he feels claustrophobic, enclosed, _trapped_ , and a quick image darts to the forefront of his mind, long fingers reaching out towards him, curling tight around his wrist.

“Shiro?” Keith says.

“It’s fine.” Shiro’s metal hand twitches, humming with the slightest hint of energy. “I’m fine. Go ahead.”

There’s nowhere to lie down in the cockpit but on the floor, and even then Shiro barely manages to fit, his heels bumping against the wall when stretches out his legs. Keith kneels beside him, and despite his initial nervousness his hands are steady as he works, his stitches small and surprisingly neat. More than once Shiro has to help, pressing the flayed edges of his skin together as Keith pulls the thread through, specks of blood welling up beneath his fingers.

Keith eyes flicker, almost hidden beneath the dark fringe of his hair. At first Shiro thinks he’s looking up at him, trying to gauge Shiro’s reaction, checking to see if he’s in pain. But then it occurs to him that even though the soft-suit has only been pulled halfway up his chest, there are still scars visible on his stomach, twisted and angry, stark against his skin. 

“Done,” Keith says, falling back on his heels, reaching for a roll of gauze. 

“Great,” Shiro says. He pauses, gives Keith the chance to ask his questions, and then continues on when he doesn’t. “Thanks. You did a good job.”

Keith doesn’t respond. Shiro pushes himself up onto his elbow, tilts his head when Keith looks back to him. “You’ve really never done that before?”

“I… use to have to stitch up my old clothes,” Keith says, quiet but not embarrassed. “You know, when money was tight.”

Shiro nods and doesn’t say anything more about it. He lets Keith finish dressing the wound before digging out a couple of protein bars, tossing one to Keith and listening to the quiet hum of the black lion’s cockpit as they eat.

“How long can we last out here, do you think?” Keith asks.

Shiro shrugs. “If we ration the… rations and presume we can just eat the snow for water… a couple of weeks?”

“Will that be enough?”

“Allura will find us long before it’s not. She tracked down the lions once already, right?”

“The Galra will be looking, too.”

“Blindly. They’ll have no idea where to start.”

“I mean… they were the ones who messed up the wormhole. So they might.”

Shiro’s not sure how to counter that point. “Well… let’s hope not.”

“Encouraging.”

“Hey, cut me some slack. I’m injured.”

“Yeah.” Keith swallows, crinkling the ration’s wrapper in his hand. “You should get some sleep.”

“You too. It’s been a long day.”

“I can keep watch, for awhile.”

“I don’t think you have to. The lion’s sensors will pick up on anything long before we do.”

“Would they wake us, though?”

“I’m a pretty light sleeper.” 

Shiro stretches out on he floor again, raising his eyebrows in a silent form of encouragement until Keith huffs out a breath and deigns to settle down next to him, leaving a gap between their arms. In truth, Shiro doubts he’ll get much rest, anyways. He can’t remember the last time he managed to sleep through the night. If it’s not the nightmares that rouse him it’s something else, the rumbling of the castle as it conducts some kind of scan, Allura’s mice skittering through the vents. No matter how harmless or common the sound may be, Shiro always wakes the same way, with his chest tight and heart racing, his hand raised and ready to strike.

“Shiro?”

“Hm?”

“I— I think I need to tell you something.” 

He sounds strange, Shiro thinks. Hesitant and uncertain, not at all like the Keith Shiro knows.

“Keith?”

“Zarkon had a bayard,” Keith says, choking out the words like they’re being torn from him.

Shiro opens his eyes. For a moment it feels as though his heart has gone still in his chest before it starts to beat again, pounding hard against his ribs.

“He—” Shiro’s voice dies in his throat. He drags the sore edge of his tongue against his teeth, lets the pain ground him.

“He said some things, too,” Keith continues. “I think—he was the black lion’s paladin. Before you.”

“Allura would have known that,” Shiro says quietly, unsure of how he feels, what he should be doing with that information.

Keith says nothing, and Shiro thinks that he should pester him for more details, demand some kind of clarification. But then he remembers the Galra insignia flooding the black lion’s view screens, the controls locking under his hands and the jolt of his seat rocketing backwards, throwing him out into space, and whatever he means to ask withers and turns to dust in his mouth. 

Silence stretches out between them like a taught rope, until exhaustion wins out and Keith’s breath begins to slow. Shiro tries to match it, holding up his prosthetic arm and splaying his fingers, peering up at the cockpit’s domed ceiling through the gaps.

_Can you hear me?_ He wonders. _Am I just a poor replacement? A temporary pilot until he takes you back?_

Shiro doesn’t expect the black lion to respond, not now, but her silence still falls over him like a physical weight, settling deep in his chest like a stone.


	2. Chapter 2

Keith had nearly been expelled from the garrison three times before they finally kicked him out. He earned his first strike during his second year, when he broke a senior cadet’s nose.

It hadn’t been his fault. Williams had been hounding him for months, needling at Keith from behind the backs of their instructors, wondering loudly where some foster-brat learned to fly so well, the implication that Keith was somehow cheating the system or rigging his scores hovering beneath every scoffing remark or disbelieving jeer he made.

It was stupid, and juvenile, and shouldn’t have bothered Keith as much as it did. It wasn’t like the other students even believed it. The garrison’s equipment was far too advanced for just anyone to hack, and Keith had never really excelled at the technical aspects that came along with piloting, anyways. His programming scores were proof enough of that.

Even so, the rumours took hold, warping into some kind of joke that Keith didn’t understand but everyone else seemed to. Keith would answer a question correctly, or ace a test, or beat out the rest of his class in the simulator, and the other cadets would roll their eyes or laugh, brushing him off as if he got lucky, as if he just preformed a neat but innocuous little trick.

It set Keith’s teeth on edge, but he could deal with it. He knew he was skilled, knew he’d be among the first chosen for the early fighter pilot candidacy so long as he kept his head low and mouth shut. So he crumpled up his anger, crammed it down into the pit of his stomach and left it to sit. And maybe it would have stayed there, harmless and quiet, if he hadn’t left the simulator one day to find Williams standing outside the door, waiting for him.

“Don’t you ever get tired of doing the same sims over and over again, just so you can knock out the highest mark in your class?” Williams asked, crossing his arms. “I mean, seriously, you know that’s kind of sad, right?”

“Never done it before,” Keith said, wiping the back of his hand over his forehead. He made to grab his duffle, but Williams stepped in front of him, blocking it.

Williams said, “No one passes the Echo run on their first try.”

“Not you, maybe.” 

Williams' face turned red. He caught Keith’s collar when he tried to push around him, hauling him forward an extra step to break his balance before slamming Keith back against the hub of the simulator. 

Pain shuddered up Keith’s spine, fanned out across his shoulders, and his reaction was immediate. His fist cracked against Williams’ mouth and nose, cartridge crunching beneath his knuckles, and the wet, squelching sound of it, the hot splash of blood on Williams’ cheek and down the front of his shirt, came as a shock to them both. By the time Keith realized what he’d done it was too late, and Williams was slumping to his knees as Keith stumbled to get away and out of arms reach.

That was how Iverson found them, with Williams hunched over and clutching his face and Keith rubbing at his split knuckle with his thumb. 

Williams was ushered off to the infirmary while Keith was dragged in front of his superiors to explain what had happened. Keith told the truth, words clipped and head bowed, burning with anger and self-righteous feelings of injustice. He was positive that they would doubt his word, that Williams would spin his own story about Keith attacking him and Iverson and the rest would believe it because Keith— well. He was Keith, just a weirdo outcast with a bad attitude and a disciplinary problem.

“I didn’t mean to,” Keith said, hoarsely. “I just—”

They didn’t care, and, in the end, it didn’t matter. The surveillance footage confirmed that Williams initiated the conflict, and though Carter and Grant still pushed for Keith’s expulsion, it was Iverson who begrudgingly drew attention to his test and simulation scores, already resting within the top five percentile of the garrison’s junior cadets.

“Don’t think you’re getting off easy. This is a formal warning, cadet,” Iverson said. “Your access to the grounds is revoked until further notice, and you can enjoy latrine duty for the next two months. Now, get out of my sight and go have that hand looked at.”

Keith went to his room instead, furious, twitching with adrenaline. He planted his heel against the edge of his bunk, kicking it until his leg ached, and by the following day his fingers were swollen and bruised, which prompted Shiro to ask him if his hand was okay the next time they ran into each other at the gym.

Keith barely heard the question though his headphones, only took them out and asked for clarification because it was Takashi Shirogane who was speaking to him. 

“What?”

Shiro was on the treadmill to Keith’s left, a little flushed and sweaty around the neck from his workout, his hair damp and gleaming in the florescent light. They had fallen into a strange routine, the two of them, and Keith still wasn’t quite sure how it happened. He went to the gym specifically at this time to avoid people, but more often than not Shiro would already be there, would look up and greet Keith like he was happy to see him and then proceed to chat with him over the next hour.

It was the kind of thing that would, usually, annoy Keith, but Shiro was so inoffensive, so stubbornly _genuine_ in everything he did and said, it was difficult for Keith to really mind.

“Your hand,” Shiro said.

“It’s fine.” Keith jabbed at the control pad with his sore fingers, raising his speed.

Shiro huffed out a breath, laughing a little, but not in a way that made Keith uncomfortable. He increased his own pace to match, lifting an eyebrow when Keith looked back at him.

“Wanna race?” Shiro asked.

“You’ll wear yourself out,” Keith said. Shiro had already been at the weights when Keith arrived.

“Look who’s talking.”

Keith turned his eyes forward and waited, expecting Shiro to change the subject, ask about the fight. He must had known about it –everyone else in the garrison seemed to. But then, there was probably no way to really keep it quiet with Williams walking around looking like he did, gauze covering half his face, eyes bloodshot and bruised.

“He started it,” said Keith, all though Shiro hadn’t spoken. 

“Probably. Williams is a jerk.” Shiro frowned, gulping down a clumsy breath of air. “You could have told me, you know. If he was giving you a hard time.”

“Why would I have done that?”

“Why not? We talk, sometimes.”

“So? We’re not—” Keith cut himself off. They might not had been friends, but Keith also couldn’t deny that Shiro was the only other cadet in the entire garrison that he actively _liked_ , and didn’t want to lose his occasional companionship over an argument about something stupid like semantics. 

“And what would you have done?” Keith asked instead. His lungs were beginning to feel tight and there was stitch throbbing at his side. “Tell him to back off?”

“Sure,” Shiro said, like it was nothing, like it would have been that easy. 

And maybe it would have been, for him, the garrison’s golden boy, future ace pilot. People didn’t resent Shiro for his talent. He was humble where Keith was proud, likable when Keith wasn’t.

Shiro tapped his control pad, throwing up his hands in defeat before placing them on his hips, slowing to a brisk walk as his chest heaved. Keith didn’t do the same. He still felt like he was losing, somehow.

Shiro stepped off the treadmill, scrubbing the palm of his hand over his forehead, slicking the little tuff of hair at his brow back against his scalp. Keith expected him to grab his towel and head for the showers, but instead Shiro veered back, hooking his elbow over the grips of Keith’s machine.

“Hey,” he said, titling his head. “You can slow it down, kiddo. You’ve already won.”

“Don’t – call – me – that,” Keith said, barely managing to spit the words out between lungfuls of air.

Shiro grinned at him, the corners of his eyes crinkling in a way that made him look very young. He cupped a hand to his ear. “What? Couldn’t quite hear you.”

Keith wrinkled his nose, didn’t complain when Shiro laughed and took the liberty of tapping the control pad for him. Keith accepted Shiro’s water bottle when it was offered, and it felt like Shiro was trying to tell him something, teach him a lesson without going so far as to cram it down his throat.

Things got a little better for Keith, after that. The other cadets still didn’t like him but they quieted down, and Williams stayed away. Keith suspected Shiro had more to do with that than the fight did, but never successfully worked up the courage to ask him about it.

 

\--

 

Keith wakes to the sound of Shiro moving about in the cockpit, his boots tramping against the metal floor in a clunky, uneven rhythm that implies he’s favouring one leg over the other.

“You’re loud,” Keith says with a groan, scrubbing at his face as he sits up. His back is stiff from dozing in his armour, and every other inch of his body, already battered and bruised from being tossed about in the red lion’s cockpit during his fight with Zarkon, protests in its own subtle and less-so-subtle ways as he moves.

“Sorry,” Shiro says, and Keith looks up at him. 

Shiro hasn’t bothered in replacing the top portion of his armour. Keith almost wishes he would, so his eyes wouldn’t be drawn to the ugly, ragged tear in his soft-suit, the dark stain of old blood surrounding it. Gingerly, as to not pull at his stitches, Shiro crosses an arm over his chest and grips at his opposite shoulder as he rolls it back and forth in its socket, a slight wince forming around his eye.

Shiro says, “Bet you never thought you’d miss the garrison dorms, huh?”

Keith shrugs. He doesn’t, really. The only place he’s ever lived that he thinks back on with any sense of longing is the little rundown shack in the desert where he stayed for five months. He liked its creaky floors and rattling windowsills, liked that it was his own and that he could climb onto the roof in the evening and watch red dust billow along the curve of the horizon, the colour pallet of the land shifting as the sun set. 

“How are you feeling?” Keith asks.

“I’m all right,” Shiro says. “Bit sore.”

“You’re not looking great,” Keith says, because he doesn’t really want to indulge in Shiro’s evasive crap right now and because Shiro’s face is wan and pale but for the hot splotches of colour resting high on his cheeks, the dark circles tucked beneath his eyes. 

The corner of Shiro’s mouth tightens. “I didn’t sleep well,” he says, with just a touch of guilt, like he’s been caught in a lie. 

The words seem genuine, but they do little to ease Keith’s suspicions. Shiro’s a good actor, when he wants to be, using half-truths and the sheer force of his personality to hide whatever he’s really thinking or feeling.

Keith hates this. He hates being stuck on this barren planet, that he doesn’t know where the others are, hates that Shiro’s injured and still feels the need to act like he’s fine when Keith knows —he _knows_ — that he’s not.

“I’m gonna go test the snow,” Keith says, itching with the need to do _something_.

“You should eat first,” Shiro says, though he doesn’t push the issue when Keith ignores him and reaches for his helmet. 

There’s been no change in the weather, as far as Keith can tell. He squints from behind his faceplate, almost falling when his leg sinks into the snow up to his knee as he walks out onto the alien planet. He grits his teeth and hobbles forward a few steps with his arms outstretched, infinitely grateful Lance isn’t there to see him. His suit hums as the internal heaters kick in, and Keith swivels left and right, eyes narrowing as he tries to peer through the storm, the squall of snow so thick he can barely make out the red lion’s silhouette in the distance. It takes so long for him to spot it that for one heart-stopping moment Keith fears the robot’s been buried by the snow before he catches a glimpse of it shimmering particle barrier through the gale, surrounding the lion like a bubble and keeping the blizzard at bay.

Keith blows out a sigh and gracelessly drops to his knees, snow crunching beneath his weight. 

“How’s it looking?” Shiro asks, making Keith jump, his voice so clear he might as well be standing at Keith’s side.

“Uh,” Keith says. He unfastens the handheld scanner from his hip and passes it over the snow. “You read Altean?”

Shiro laughs, but it doesn’t sound quite right, tight and forced. “Did the screen flash red?”

“No.”

“Then it’s safe to eat,” Shiro says. “Ever try snow cones?”

“What?” Keith hooks the scanner back into place, digging his fingers into the snow and rolling a clump of it round between his palms.

“It’s basically just ice and—I don’t know, syrupy food colouring, I guess.”

“Sounds like the kind of thing Lance would eat,” Keith says. “You know, gross?”

“I don’t think Lance has that much of a sweet tooth, actually. And I know you used to hide chocolate in your room.”

“You do not,” Keith says, all though he did, and Shiro does.

Keith comes back inside with two snowballs. He finds Shiro sitting at the helm, leaning back in his chair as the view screen flashes through a series of diagnosis tests that Allura always insists they all do and that no one ever does.

He plants the clump of snow into Shiro’s palm. “Keeping busy?”

“Trying to. Maybe after this we should see if we can do anything for the red lion.”

Keith pulls off his helmet, licking experimentally at the snowball before taking a small bite. He doesn’t know how to answer Shiro. He wants nothing more than to correct his mistake with the red lion, but isn’t sure how far he should be encouraging Shiro to push himself.

Shiro breaks a protein bar in half, offering Keith the larger portion.

Keith shakes his head. “You eat it.”

“Keith,” Shiro says. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

And Keith thinks, _You haven’t mentioned Zarkon._

It was a mistake, for him to tell Shiro the way he did. It was too soon, touched too close to a raw nerve, a frayed wire, that little broken piece of himself that Shiro keeps guarded and tucked away. Keith should have waited, questioned Allura or Coran about it first, find out the whole story so he could have offered more than a broken splinter of information for Shiro to gnaw at.

“Does it bother you, that I flunked out of the garrison?” Keith asks, desperate not to say what he’s really contemplating, suddenly afraid that he will.

Shiro startles, brows pulling into a frown as he blinks.

“Does—what? Where’s this coming from?”

“Just something I’ve been wondering about.”

“Would it matter, if it bothered me?”

Keith suspects Shiro poses these kinds of questions not because he actually wants to know the answer, but because he wants Keith to think about the implication of what he’s asking. 

It’s a habit that annoys Keith to no end.

“Apparently,” Keith says, his tone flat, unimpressed.

Shiro smiles a little. “If you hadn’t been kicked out, you probably wouldn’t have been there to help me when I got back.”

“That’s not a real answer,” Keith tells him.

“Yes it is,” Shiro says, in that infuriatingly calm way of his. 

“You recommended me, didn’t you?” Keith says, still pushing, annoyed now for some inexplicable reason. “For the fighter pilot candidacy.”

“We both know your name was on that list from the moment you stepped out of the simulator for the first time. You’re an excellent pilot.”

“With a very imperfect record. It’s not like the garrison, to ignore that.”

Shiro considers him for a moment. He shoves the rest of the snowball into his mouth, resting an elbow on the arm of his chair as he chews, cheek pressed against his fist. It strikes Keith, not for the first time, how much older Shrio looks, how the lines on his brow and the grey in his hair still clash against the image of Shiro that exists in Keith’s head.

“When I was chosen for the Kerberos mission, they asked for my opinion on some of the younger cadets they still had some misgivings towards. Your name came up, and I told them that squandering the potential of a promising pilot by sticking him in the already overfilled cargo class didn’t seem very inline with the garrison’s mission.” 

“… Oh,” Keith says, unsure of what to do with that answer now that he has it.

“I didn’t tell them that because you’re my friend, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Shiro continues. “You deserved to be in that program, Keith, and the garrison made a mistake in expelling you.”

Keith stares at him, the back of his neck growing warm. Another annoying habit of Shiro’s: the way he gives out compliments like they’re nothing, like he’s listing off some kind of obscure fact that’s true whether or not you or anyone else wants to believe it.

Shiro tilts his head, taking in Keith’s reaction, his smile sharpening into something a little more amused and a little less nice as he turns back towards the controls. “Sorry. Wasn’t trying to embarrass you.”

There’s a small amount of snow left in Keith’s hand. He considers tossing it at Shiro’s head when a whining crackle of static bursts across the comms, making him jump. He darts forward, curling his fingers over the top of Shiro’s chair, heart pounding against his ribs. “Is that…?”

“Maybe. Hold on,” Shiro says, swiping a hand over the controls, trying to focus the signal.

The feedback increases before suddenly dropping off, and a tinny, hollow voice rises beneath the overlay of white noise, growing louder as the message repeats.

“Paladins! Paladins, are you there? Can you hear me?”

“We hear you, Allura,” Shiro says, his face splitting into a grin, dark eyes flashing in the light of the console. “Decided to come find us after all, huh?”

“Oh, come on,” a different voice cuts in. “It’s been what, twelve hours?” 

“Twelve hours is kind of a long time, Pidge,” Keith says, and something tight in his chest, that he barely even noticed until just now, begins to loosen.

Pidge laughs, and the sound of it is bright and clear even through layers of static. 

“Who else is there?” Shiro asks.

“Just us three,” Coran says. “All though we’ve already worked out the location of the blue and yellow lions.”

Shiro lifts his chin and catches Keith’s eye, worry setting in along the stiff line of his jaw, the tight pull of his mouth.

“But?”

“Good news, bad news,” Pidge sighs.

“We’ve tracked the lions’ coordinates to the same solar system,” Coran says. “But we think Lance must be stuck, maybe without much power. His lion’s caught in a planet’s gravitational pull and hasn’t moved.”

“Well,” Keith mutters. “That figures.”

Shiro makes a sound, nudging at him with his elbow. “You’re one to talk, buddy.”

“Oooh… what’d Keith do?” Pidge asks, sounding excited at the prospect of Keith being called out. It’s the kind of reaction born from having a sibling, Keith thinks.

“Nothing,” Keith says.

“You’ll see when you get here,” Shiro tells her. “Speaking of which…?”

“Thirty more ticks,” Allura says. “And I’m afraid Lance’s condition isn’t our only problem. The solar system where the other two lions are located is known Galra territory.”

Keith scrubs a hand over his eyes, and anything light rising up inside him suddenly turns to lead. Next to him, Shiro sighs, and Keith thinks that he’s beginning to look worst, the scar on the bridge of his nose darkening as colour continues to drain from his face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow okay I swear this will start picking up in chapter three. If you want to say hi or just watch my slow but seemingly inevitable descent into Voltron hell, feel free to check out my [tumblr](http://lightshesaid.tumblr.com/).
> 
> Thank you for reading, lovelies.


	3. Chapter 3

Something’s wrong.

Shiro’s known it from the moment he woke up, stifling a choked gasp out against the palm of his prosthetic, breathing in hard through his nose and holding the air in his lungs long enough to feel the burn of it swell within his chest. His fingers were trembling, devastatingly cold against the flushed skin of his mouth and jaw, and for a moment Shiro could almost convince himself that it was fine, that he was still safe, that all of it—the fingers around his neck and his own gleaming eyed reflection laughing at him, the grey sludge seeping down his throat—had been nothing more than a dream. 

Next to him, Keith stirred, wrinkling his nose as his eyes shifted behind closed lids. He made an uncomfortable noise in his sleep as his head lolled against the steel floor, and Shiro breathed into the hand that wasn’t his own as he watched him, clinging to the image like an anchor. He let it sink, dragging him down through the tangled mess of this own thoughts, cutting a clear, straight line for his memories to follow.

The claw marks at his waist throbbed, searing as though they were freshly made. Shiro stifled a groan as he dragged his hand down along his side, finding the rough edge of the gauze through the thin material of his soft-suit. The wound ached beneath his touch but there was no new dampness marking the cloth under his fingers, and when Shiro forced himself to his feet, lifting the top portion of his suit and peeling away the bandage for a better look, he noticed no difference in the wound but for the slight spread of the blue marbling pattern beneath his skin. Tentatively, he prodded at the marks, winding back towards their root, and a fresh spike of pain fanned out beneath his fingers only when they drifted too close to Keith’s stitches.

There was a headache building behind Shiro’s eyes, sweat rising to his skin in beads along the base of his neck. He searched through the med-kits as quietly as he could, glancing at Keith every time something zipped or clicked a little too loudly. The only thing he found that resembled antibiotics was a small pack of brightly coloured pills that someone—Coran, maybe—had labeled in Altean. Shiro turned the package round between his fingers, the pills shifting beneath its clear covering, and thumbed at the seal before tucking the medicine away again. He wasn’t desperate enough to risk ingesting one. Not yet. 

Keith woke not long after, stretching his neck from side to side, his hair sticking up along the back of his head in a manner that made him look very boyish. He rubbed a hand down his face and asked Shiro how he was feeling, his bleary-eyed gaze sharpening in response to Shiro’s dismissive reply. Tension coiled up Keith’s spine, hunched around his shoulders, and stayed there until he pushed himself to his feet, stomping his way outside into the cold. 

Shiro opened the hatch, watching as the red splashes of colour marking Keith’s armour vanished into the white of the storm. It happened so quickly, between one heartbeat and the next, that Shiro almost called him back in alarm, fumbling for his helmet and slipping it over his ears. But Keith was still there, his breath huffing over the comms, making vaguely displeased sounds at the snow, and Shiro’s warning died in his throat as he breathed out a sigh, slouching into his chair.

Still, his initial flash of anxiety remained, urging him to speak out when Keith fell silent for too long. It wasn’t an unusual reaction, Shiro knew. They were stranded on a barren alien planet together, and it was Shiro’s responsibility as leader to watch over the others. Of course he would feel worried, sending Keith out there alone.

But it needled at him. Shiro hadn’t been like this, before— _before_. Even as a cadet, Shiro was never made nervous by all the things that seemed to bother his classmates. He didn’t stress about the simulator scores or exams, didn’t shy away from chatting up an attractive boy or girl at a moment’s whim. He certainty didn’t lie in bed at night mulling over everything to come the following day, imaging in vivid detail each little thing that could possibly go wrong, how the world was bound to crumble around him should he take one hasty misstep in the wrong direction. 

He wondered sometimes, how much Keith noticed. He was always the first to ask Shiro if he was all right when he froze in the middle of a mission or training simulation, to seek him out when he wandered away on his own for too long. The problem was that he knew Shiro too well, could see the cracks the others didn’t. If Shiro had been stranded with Lance or Hunk, he might have been successful in convincing them that he was fine. Pidge would have been skeptical, would have pushed back, been far more vocal about it than Keith, even. But she would have wanted to believe him, and maybe that impulse would have been stronger.

It should have been a relief, when Allura’s words came crackling across the comms, her voice commanding and strong even through the buzz of interference. And it was, mostly, to learn that the castle was on its way, that Pidge was safe. But something inside of Shiro began to grow tense as the conversation went on, as if guarding against an underhanded blow. 

Shiro didn’t know what he hated more: the persistence of his anxiety, or how often it was proven right.

 

\--

 

“Nothing’s ever easy,” Shiro says, turning to Keith. He expects him to agree, or scoff, maybe even smirk, but Keith only looks at him with a curiously blank expression, his eyes wide and lamp-lit in the dim glow of the console.

It takes time, getting the red lion off the ground. The particle barrier may have shielded her from the storm, but the initial crash has left her almost half buried in snow. Shiro waits as Keith checks over the robot’s systems, and though the jets work and the red lion’s joints shudder and whine in response to Keith’s efforts, she’s still not strong enough to rise beneath her own power.

“Hold on,” Shiro says, tucking the black lion’s nose under the bulk of the red lion’s hull, giving her a push just as the castle breaches the atmosphere, breaking through the dark clouds lingering overhead. 

“Need me to come out there with a shovel?” Pidge asks, her face flashing onto the black lion’s screen.

“Pidge. Stop finding this funny,” Keith says.

“ _Are_ there shovels on the ship?” Shiro wonders, shifting the black lion’s paw backwards, dragging a pile of snow along with it.

“What,” Coran cuts in, “you mean a terrain scooper?”

“You are definitely making that name up,” Pidge says. “And I’m actually being sort of serious. I can get in the green lion and help, if you need me to.”

“I think we’re okay, Pidge,” Shiro says. “Keith, I’m going to see if I can lift you. Might be a bit harder when we’re not in zero-g, so you’ll have to use whatever power you have to try and keep your lion balanced, okay?”

“Gotcha.”

Shiro leans back on the controls, the gale blustering around his lion as they push away from the icy tundra. The red lion’s thrusters sputter and cough, two of them cutting out completely before flaring back to life. They rise together slowly, and the red lion wobbles dangerously as they approach the castle, almost tumbling out of the black lion’s grip. Shiro has to compensate for the shift in weight, almost turning his lion over and onto its side as he swings Keith back around.

“Sorry,” Keith grunts.

“Don’t worry about it. Doing okay?”

“Red’s distracting me. She’s kind of mad.”

“That you broke her?” Pidge asks.

Shiro glances at her through the screen, offering a chiding look that makes Pidge roll her eyes but deflate.

“ _No,_ ” Keith says. “She’s mad about Zarkon. That we couldn’t—finish the job.”

“That’s not just on you two,” Shiro says, his grip tightening around the controls. 

He hesitates before nudging at the black lion, a little mental push for her attention. He wants to know her reaction to that, if she’s angry or pleased with Keith, if discussing Zarkon’s death causes her distress. The sensation of reaching for her is not unlike pressing his hand against a stone wall, smooth and cold beneath the underbelly of his fingers, gleaming like obsidian and reflecting nothing but his own face.

The first time Shiro stepped into the black lion that wall turned to water, giving beneath Shiro’s touch and breaking over him like a wave. Shiro settled at the controls, bowed his head, and the black lion shuddered to life around him, the faint brush of her consciousness burning through him like a star. 

— _Child,_ she called him, or maybe she said _young,_ or _small_. It was difficult, to form words from the images she laid out behind his eyes, the haze of emotions that hovered along the thin barrier dividing them.

— _Afraid?_ She might have asked. 

— _No,_ Shiro said, and also: _Yes._ The answers overlapped, braided together, became one indistinguishable and undeniable pulse in Shiro’s head. 

— _Why?_

Curiosity or wonder hummed through the thread of their bond, but Shiro suspected he was somehow supplying the word himself, trying to make sense of something incomprehensible.

— _Humbled_ , he said, wanting to clarify, and the black lion rumbled in response, not displeased, but seemingly perplexed by the notion. 

But then, if her former paladin had been Zarkon, maybe she’d never encountered the concept before.

Shiro guides the red lion into the castle, checking with Keith before pulling away and flying around to dock in his own hanger. The door seals behind him with a heavy thud, and though Shiro knows the others will be waiting he leans back in his seat, lets out a slow, stuttering breath, and allows himself a moment. The pain at his waist has faded to a dull twinge, but the inside of his head still feels swollen and bruised. He pulls off his gauntlets and his helmet, drawing a hand back over his scalp. His temples are dewy with sweat, and the short hair at the base of his skull crackles against his palm when he scrubs at it.

Shiro cups the back of his neck and glances up. Without his helmet there’s no sound to accompany the images on screen, but still he watches as the others reunite. Pidge lifts her chin when Keith approaches, no doubt greeting him with some chirping remark. Behind her, Allura’s shoulders ease into a delicate line as she places a hand over her mouth, the soft shape of her eyes betraying her smile. Coran is less reserved, stepping forward to clap a hand to Keith’s arm, shaking him with enough force to make him stumble.

They turn to the black lion as one, and Shiro lip-reads his name from Pidge’s mouth, watches as concern gathers to mark Allura’s brow in fine lines. Keith crosses his arms and says something to Coran, lifting his hand in a vague gesture as if to ask Shiro what he’s waiting for. 

The corner of Shiro’s mouth tilts, a dull little smile that he’s glad they can’t see. He braces himself. 

“Shiro!” Pidge rushes over to meet him at the base of the ramp as he descends from the black lion, her eyes wide and round behind her glasses. “You didn’t say you were hurt!”

Shiro looks down at himself, tracing his thumb along the crack in his armour, flecks of dried blood rubbing off beneath his touch.

“Keith stitched me up,” Shiro says, offering Pidge a wry smile that she doesn’t return.

“I’m sorry.” Allura steps forward, her skirt whispering around her ankles as she moves. “I saw—I knew you were injured, but Pidge was closer and we didn’t think retrieving her would take as long as it did.”

“It’s all right, Princess,” Shiro says, a little too quickly. “I understand.”

Coran cants his head behind Allura’s back, moustache twitching, and Shiro wonders if he’s given himself away. 

He’s not angry with Allura. Not for a moment does Shiro believe there had been any ill-intent in her choice to keep the truth about the black lion’s origins a secret from him. Even so, there’s a thorny knot caught between Shiro’s ribs that almost seems to _twist_ in response to the sincerity in her bright eyes, and no matter how he tries Shiro can’t seem to pry it loose.

“No matter,” Coran says, moving to stand by Allura’s side. “A quick visit to the healing pods will fix you right up.”

Shiro winces. “About that.”

“Shiro,” Keith says. His voice is low, though he looks more concerned than angry.

“Just— listen to me. The red lion can’t fly, let alone fight, and it sounds like the blue lion’s probably damaged, too. We can’t send Pidge out there to get Lance alone. Not when there’s Galra in the area.”

Pidge is looking up at him, chewing at her lower lip. “Hunk could meet me and help. If we’re quick about it, the Galra might never know we’re there.”

Shiro turns to Allura. “How close is Hunk to Lance?”

“They’re on opposite ends of the solar system. If the yellow lion’s in working condition and there are no checkpoints to stop him…” Allura pauses, shakes her head, earrings tinkling. 

“A lot of ifs,” Shiro says.

“Yes.”

“Are we just ignoring that you’re injured?” Keith says, throwing up his hands. “How is this even a discussion?”

Shiro shrugs, crossing his arms. “It’s not, really.”

Keith turns to him, hackles raised, ready for a fight. Shiro stares him down until something vulnerable and dark shifts behind Keith’s eyes. He flushes, shifts his weight, and guilt bubbles inside of Shiro like hot oil. 

“Are you certain, Shiro?” Allura asks, redirecting his attention. Her expression is open and imploring without the barest hint of judgment, and Shiro looks back to Keith and then Pidge, weighing the question.

Would he be more of a liability than an asset to Pidge, if he went on the mission? 

Could he forgive himself, if he stayed behind and she was attacked?

“It’s not ideal,” Shiro says. “But I think it’s the right call.”

Allura considers him. Shiro’s unsure what he’ll say if she disagrees. He might be the leader of the paladins but she’s their commander, and despite everything, Shiro trusts her enough to yield to her decision. 

“All right,” she says.

“That armour will have to be replaced,” Coran says, stepping forward as Keith turns away, Pidge following close at his side. “And I want to take a look at your injury, too.”

“Do you have medical training?” Shiro asks, lifting an eyebrow.

Coran scoffs, lifting his chin and smoothing down both ends of his moustache with his forefinger and thumb. “You don’t get to be someone in my position without picking up a thing or two, I’ll have you know.”

There’s a healing pod already on stand by when they enter the infirmary, and Shiro’s eyes pass over it quickly before he turns away, a pang of discomfort settling low in his chest. He’s not claustrophobic, but dreads the thought of being put under, of sleeping somewhere cold and alone that he can’t choose to leave.

A long, metal table materializes seemingly out of thin air, hovering in place at Shiro’s hip. Shiro eyes at it warily, opting to lean against it after shucking off his chest plate. Coran cuts straight through the front of his soft-suit and peels it away like a second skin, tugging the gauze padding off along with it. 

“Looks painful,” Coran comments lightly, eyes narrowing at Shiro's wound as he tilts his head, tapping a finger against his chin.

“It was,” Shiro admits. “More than it should have been, maybe.”

“Past tense?”

“Stopped hurting a little while ago.”

Coran doesn’t touch him, but his hand hovers cautiously over the strange pattern marking Shiro’s skin. The colour has changed, Shiro notes, shifting from blue to a rich, ripe violet.

Coran asks, “Is this some soft of human healing quirk, or…?”

“No. I don’t know what they are.”

Coran hums and turns away. He summons a hovering tray to side with a crook of his finger, lifting a syringe from its surface before making a _gimmie_ motion towards Shiro’s arm.

Shiro straightens, shakes his head, incredulous. “What—no. What is that?”

“Let’s call it a booster. If there’s anything wrong with—” Coran flaps his hand at Shiro’s wound “— _that_ , this should help clear it up. Not that it’s any replacement for what a healing-pod can do, mind you, but if you’re still insisting on joining Pidge— well. It’s better than nothing.”

“You don’t think this is a good idea,” Shiro says.

“I’m not sure what I think, to be quite honest. It’s a risk, sending Pidge out alone, and it’s also a risk for you to go with when you’re not at 100 percent.”

 _Am I ever?_ Shiro doesn’t say. 

He eyes the syringe. “Is that safe, for non-alteans?”

“I’ve taken your biology into account, minimized the dose.” Coran lifts his eyebrows. “I wouldn’t give you something harmful.”

“I know that,” Shiro says. He offers Coran his arm, and when Coran takes his wrist his grip is firmer than Shiro expects it to be, startling him. 

“There’s no shame in opting out of this, Shiro,” Coran says. “Allura and I can provide Pidge cover from the castle.”

“That won’t be enough if she’s met by a fleet. I can do this, Coran.”

“Very well.” Coran slips the point of the needle beneath Shiro’s skin, just below the crook of his elbow. The liquid inside is a soft, clear green, and Shiro watches as it drains away, resisting the urge to rub at his arm when Coran pulls back. There’s a slight tingling sensation that courses down towards his wrist, but Coran assures him its normal as he retrieves a new soft-suit and chest plate for him to wear.

“Here you go,” he says, laying them out on the table. “And no one got a chance to say it before, but we’re all glad you’re back safe, Shiro. You and Keith both.”

“Thanks, Coran. Let’s save the real celebration for when Lance and Hunk get back, hm?”

“Of course. Why, I might even still have some nunvill left for the occasion.”

 

\--

 

Keith is all but radiating displeasure when Shiro and Coran enter the command centre. He’s standing off against the far wall with his foot kicked back, arms crossed tightly over his chest as he stares pointedly at the view screen. He looks every inch like the surly teenager Shiro met back at the Garrison, and he would be amused by the sight if it wasn’t so worrisome to see him revert. 

“Stop pouting,” Pidge says, knocking the toe of her boot against Keith’s ankle. She’s standing at Keith’s side, shifting her weight from one leg to the other, clicking and unclicking the clasps that keep her gloves in place. It’s strange, to see her there instead of pecking away at her laptop or fiddling with some gnarled piece of alien tech. Pidge usually prefers to step away from the others during the tense moments leading up to a mission, occupying herself with some trivial little activity to keep her nerves in check. 

“I’m not,” Keith says.

Shiro veers towards them, settling against the wall and bracketing Keith between himself and Pidge. He tips sideways until their shoulders knock together, keeps going until Keith is forced to either shove him off or bow beneath the added weight.

Keith pushes, of course, grumbling as he elbows half-heartedly at Shiro’s ribs. Shiro chuckles and eases back, though he refuses to be completely dislodged. 

“You’re pouting a little,” Shiro says, stage-whispering. Pidge leans forward just enough to catch his eye, nodding once as she points her finger at him. 

“Shut up.” Keith turns his head just enough to flick his eyes towards Shiro. “Just—watch yourself, okay?”

Pidge snorts, rudely. “Wow. Should I watch myself too, or…?”

“I mean, I _guess_ ,” Keith says, the shadow of a smile on his lips.

The castle shudders around them as a wormhole ripples into existence, swirling like a whirlpool composed of nothing but light and colour, overtaking almost the entirety of the screen. 

“I’ll hail Hunk the moment we’re through,” Allura says from her place at the podium, standing tall with her hands planted atop the pedestals at her sides. She twists around to look at them from over her shoulder, a few loose wisps of hair trailing along her jaw and drifting against the back of her neck. “We don’t’ want to draw attention to ourselves, so we’ll come out as close to Lance as possible and use the neighboring planet’s gravity to hide our ship’s signature. I’ll survey the area while you collect the blue lion, and from there we can decide if we need to go after Hunk or if it would be better for him to meet us.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Shiro says, stepping forward.

From the first time his mother took him up to the roof and presented him with a telescope, Shiro had been fascinated by space. He knew, one day, that he wanted to go there, knew that the universe was vast and he was so small but thought that maybe he could bring it down to scale if he had the chance. It was never frightening to him, never seemed to be anything more but just beyond his reach, a goal to work towards, something to aspire to. 

But now, Shiro guides the black lion out into the yawning void of space and some slight, broken piece of himself that refuses to knit back together shudders and twists away, recoiling. 

“Lance?” Shiro dials down the buzz of Allura’s communication line, the soft lilt of her voice fading into a hollow whisper as she calls for Hunk. “Hey, Lance? You there, buddy?”

“Maybe we’re out of range,” Pidge says, pausing a moment before adding, “all though… we shouldn’t be.” 

“His comms could be damaged. You detecting any Galra in the area?”

“Nope. Wanna go in?”

“After you.”

The green lion’s thrusters burn against the blackness of space as Pidge pushes forward, pulling out ahead. Shiro swings around, flanking her.

“Hey, Shiro?”

“Hey.”

“You’re really okay to be doing this, right?”

Shiro sighs, quietly, so the mic doesn’t pick it up. His voice is still flat when answers, “Yes, Pidge.”

“ _Yes, Pidge,_ ” she mimics, adopting a low, nasal tone.

“I don’t sound like that.”

“You do. And you shouldn’t. We’re allowed to worry about you, you know.”

“I know, I just—” 

They’re always worried about him. Shiro sees it whenever a new ragged scrap of information about his lost year is dredged into the light. Their voices fall quiet as they look at him, wide-eyed and distressed, and Shiro has to turn away, has to block it out and shut it down because he doesn’t know how long he can stand beneath the weight of their sympathy.

“I appreciate it, Pidge, I do, but I’m all right.”

Pidge doesn’t say anything for a moment, her silence stretching just long enough for Shiro to think that she’ll let the issue drop. But then she clears her throat, goes on to ask in very small, quiet voice, “You promise?”

The question makes Shiro’s throat tighten. He summons a visual and turns his head, meeting Pidge’s bright eyes through the screen.

“Promise,” Shiro says. Pidge’s expression doesn’t change, so he lifts his hand from the controls, wiggling his fingers in view of the camera. “C’mon, pinkie-swear?”

The edge of Pidge’s mouth tugs into a reluctant smile. She makes a loose fist, hooking her little finger, and laughs when Shiro does the same.

“Sounds pretty sacred, dude,” Hunk says, the sudden buzz of his voice interrupting the repetition of Allura’s message. 

Pidge’s eyes widen, either in surprise or delight. “Hunk!”

Shiro draws his hand over the control panel, raising the volume on Allura’s channel. “Good to hear from you! Are you okay?”

“Uh… mostly? I’ve been laying low with some of the locals. The planet I’m on is pretty much Galra city.”

“We thought it might be,” Allura says. “I’m sending Shiro and Pidge’s coordinates to your lion. Lance is nearby and they’re on their way to him.”

“Wait—what? He is? And what about Keith?”

“I’m here,” Keith cuts in. “Just—not flying. Long story.”

“Lance is stuck orbiting around another planet in the system,” Shiro says. “Speaking of which…”

The planet looms towards them, a gas giant encased in vivid blue and turquoise clouds. There’s little else to see apart from the occasional dark blotch marking small portions of its atmosphere, the flashes of lightening dancing along its equator. 

“Can you see the blue lion?” Shiro asks, glancing at Pidge.

“Against that? It’s going to blend right in. We have to get closer.”

“Um, guys?” Hunk’s voice wavers over the comms, fizzing with static. “I think you’ve been made. An alarm just sounded and the Galra are sort of freaking out. Fighter ships are starting to take off.”

Shiro curses, low and harsh beneath his breath. “Are you still safe?”

“Yeah. I think I need to move, though.”

“Can you risk it?” Allura asks.

“Sure? I’ll just bee-line for the castle.”

“Are you kidding?” Keith says. “That’s a terrible idea!”

“Okay, no offense man, but coming from you…”

“Don’t rush it, Hunk. Wait for an opening.” Shiro narrows his eyes at the screen, scouring every little detail of the planet until the image seems to blur, doubling over before snapping back into place.

Shiro blinks, pressing hard into his seat as his heart stutters in his chest. What—?

“The fleet’s approaching,” Allura says. “And we just picked up two war ships as well.”

“All right.” Shiro swallows, shaking his head. “Pidge, you’re on Lance. The castle and I will deal with the cover fire. If we keep the Galra busy enough maybe they won’t notice the yellow lion coming up on their six.”

“Roger that.”

Shiro kicks on the reverse thrusters, swinging around and watching as the planet whips across his screen. It vanishes beyond the edge of the frame, and the endless stretch of space that follows gives rise to a strange sense of vertigo, making Shiro’s stomach drop and his head throb. Galra fighter ships blink into view, one after the other, and Shiro has no time to pay the strange reaction any mind.

It’s far from the worst odds they’ve ever had. The fleet is small and the war ships are too slow to lock onto the black lion with any great amount of accuracy. Shiro maneuvers through their ranks, nicking ships with his lion’s mouth blade, firing at the fighters that try to swerve into his path and change his course. The castle covers his back, blasting though any formation the Galra seek to form, cutting a clear trail for Shiro to double back on whenever he’s in need of a quick escape.

“I found Lance!” Pidge cries. “But there’s still no read from his lion. It doesn’t look like it has any power at all.”

Shiro tries not to think about what that means, wincing away from images of Lance cold and alone, incased inside a metal box with the blue lion dying around him, gasping for air as its systems begin to fail. 

“Just grab him and get back here!” Keith says, snapping Shiro back to the present a moment too late.

A Galra fighter smashes directly into the black lion, sending Shiro into a tailspin as the resulting explosion overtakes and surrounds him. The red burn of it fills the screen, and the jagged insignia of the Galra empire flashes wickedly behind his eyes.

Shiro tightens his grip on the controls, his palms clammy and hot inside his gloves. No, _no_ , that’s not what’s happening. He’s fine, he’s— 

It comes from nothing, the burst of pain inside his head, the sensation of something slicing along his abdomen, ripping though his stitches and digging in deep. Shiro curls forward, gasping, hands scrabbling at his new armour, but there’s no puncture marring the surface, no cracks catching beneath his quaking fingers.

“Shiro!” Pidge shouts. “Look out!”

Shiro fumbles for the controls, yanking on them blindly, and it’s sheer luck that the blast only singes the black lion’s flank. The green lion appears from around the curve of the planet, returning fire, and Pidge has somehow roped the blue lion to her own robot, keeping the length of the cord short so it’s not trailing out behind her. 

Keith flashes on screen, his face close to the camera, arms outstretched on either side of his head. “Shiro, what’s happening? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know.” The words feel thick in Shiro’s mouth, forming clumsily on his tongue. “Maybe— a side effect?”

“What?” Keith turns sharply, looking at something Shiro can’t see. “Side effect to what?”

Coran pushes into view, his fingers dancing across a holographic keypad floating above his palm. “Unless you’re tasting sickleberries, I can assure you its not. Shiro, you need to return to the ship immediately. Your vitals are—”

Shiro can’t make out the rest, Coran’s voice turning into a disorienting warble in his ears. He pulls on the controls, trying to guide the black lion around towards the castle, and his stomach churns with the motion, clenching violently. Vomit burns against the back of his throat, and Shiro fumbles for his helmet, his gloves slipping over its smooth surface before catching beneath the visor.

“Shiro! What do you think you’re—?” Allura’s voice cuts out as he tears the helmet over his ears. It hits the wall or floor with a crack, and Shiro is twists in his seat, doubles over as he retches a mouthful of bile onto the floor, his chest heaving as moisture begins to collect at the corners of his eyes.

The pressure inside of his head builds, and a familiar spark ignites at the very core of Shiro’s skull, pulsing like living heartbeat.

 _Oh,_ he thinks muzzily, drawing the back of his hand over his mouth. _There you are._

The black lion snarls, and a confused blur of emotion twists in Shiro’s chest like a knife: irritation, disappointment, _fear_. He doesn’t know which belong to him and which don’t. The obsidian wall in Shiro’s mind wobbles and softens, swallows his reflection but refuses to yield when he presses against it.

The controls begin to move as if guided by phantom hands, and the black lion spins around smoothly, darting by the remaining fighters and slicing through a Glara ship with ease when it makes to follow. 

“Wait,” Shiro croaks. His lungs feel tight, like there’s a vise clamped around his ribs. “What about the others?”

— _Here_ , she tells him, and the yellow lion smashes through the blockade trying to form around them, knocking shoulder-to-shoulder against the black lion. It takes Shiro a moment, to understand that Hunk is trying to keep him steady. 

The screen blurs, colours bleeding together as Shiro’s vision grows hazy and dark. He struggles against the sucking undertow of unconsciousness, clinging to the black lion’s presence like a raft. She doesn’t growl or brush him away, but neither is there any sense of affection budding along the wire-thin thread of their bond. She retreats from him bit by bit, trailing away completely when the cockpit door slides open. 

Shiro flinches back from the fingers on his cheek, the hands curling over his shoulders. There are voices he trusts telling him it’s all right, that he’s going to be fine. His legs slump beneath him when he tries to stand, and an arm catches him around the waist, pressing hard against his stitches. The pain of it burns through Shiro like a flash of lightening, crackling up his spine, leaving behind the heavy taste of iron in his mouth.

“Sorry! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

Lance. Relief drains through Shiro, leaving him elated and shaky. He wants to tell Lance that he’s glad he’s there, but he can’t see to catch him breath and is hushed whenever he tries to speak. 

Shiro lifts his head, wincing at the harsh glare of the castle’s light, and his footsteps stutter when a healing pod looms into view.

“Wait.” Shiro’s hand slides against the pod’s barrier, fingers scrabbling over the surface until they catch against the frame. “I don’t—”

“Shiro—”

“It’s okay.”

“Please.”

“Enough. There’s no time for this.” 

Allura touches Shiro’s wrist, tucking her fingers beneath his palm. The smooth, rounded edge of her nails trail softly along his lifeline, and Shiro lets go before she’s forced to make him. He blinks until the details of her face begin to settle, taking in the hard set of Allura’s jaw, how it seems at odds with the worried line of her mouth, the gentle tilt of her eyes.

“You could have told me,” he says, and he’s not angry with Allura, he’s _not_ , but he wishes, desperately, that she could have trusted him. 

Allura startles, drawing back. “What are you talking about?” 

“It will keep, whatever it is,” Coran says quickly, laying his palm between Shiro’s shoulder blades, urging him forward without pushing hard enough to force him. 

Shiro steps into the pod, closing his eyes so he doesn’t have to watch the door materialize to lock him in place. Something cold and numb settles deep inside his chest, crystallizing before flowing outwards, and Shiro’s lids flutter, revealing the image of a palm pressed flat against the outside surface of the pod. His prosthetic clicks at the elbow when he tries to return the gesture, though he doesn’t remember later whether or not he succeeds.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> School + two jobs + other = no writing time. But things have settled down a little so hopefully the next chapter will be up much more quickly. If you liked this chapter please consider leaving a comment, as they nourish me in these trying times. xoxo darlings.


	4. Chapter 4

Four weeks before the Kerberos mission was scheduled to launch, Shiro cashed in the collection of personal days he’d acquired over his past year as a TA, packed a small duffle bag, and went home.

Matt texted him not five minutes after his shuttle bus pulled out onto the main road.

_Iverson is so pissed lmao._

The words were followed by a line of emoticons, multiple laughing faces complete with tears, a jaunty thumbs-up. 

Shiro frowned, typing back, _Your dad gave the okay and it’s his project, so…_

_Yeah I know that’s who Iverson’s mad at!_

_I’ll e-mail him._

_omg it’s fine Dad has it covered. I just wanted to thank you for bringing this tableau into my life. Most entertaining thing I’ve witnessed in ages._

_K weirdo. Can you apologize to your dad for me, at least? I’ll get in touch later when I have the chance._

_Fine but you know he’s just gonna give you a speech about the importance of family or some such nonsense._

_Thanks._

Another emoji followed, a kissy face with a heart. Shiro rolled his eyes, sent back the icon of a toilet, and turned off his phone.

The flight took 8 hours, and after the plane landed Shiro rented a car instead of hailing cab, oddly excited by the simple prospect of having the opportunity to drive himself around. He traveled to his mother’s house with one hand on the wheel and the other hanging out the window, sunglasses on with the radio buzzing quietly beneath the sound of rushing air, a half-eaten granola abandoned in the cup holder.

Ana was sitting on the steps to veranda at the front of the house when he arrived. She stood up as Shiro pulled into the driveway, walking across the lawn to meet him and flicking the remains of her cigarette down onto the pavement.

“Couldn’t have rented something a little nicer?” She asked in Portuguese. It took Shiro a moment to wrap his head around the language and his reply came slowly, garbled words strung together by a wavering accent.

“Why can’t you say ‘hello’ like a normal person?”

Ana recoiled, her eyes widening comically. “I understood less than half of what you just said.”

“Leave me alone, I’ve just been speaking English for almost a year—”

“You’ve been doing what for a what?” 

Shiro sighed, hanging his head and slumping his shoulders, kicking off the driveway so he could take his sister by surprise when he hugged her. She had always been at least a head smaller than him, and it was easy for Shiro to scoop her up, tilting back until Ana’s feet lifted off the ground. 

“Stop!” She shrieked as one of her sandals slipped off. But she was laughing and returning his embrace a moment later, squeezing Shiro tightly around the shoulders. 

“I just don’t get why you don’t spend some of that Garrison cash,” she said after he set her back down, rubbing her fingers together in front of Shiro’s face. “Aren’t they paying you to go to space?”

“You know I’m still in debt, right?”

“What about your scholarship?”

“Didn’t cover everything.”

“Lame.”

“Mm. Does Mom know you’re out here smoking?”

Ana paused, tilting her head slightly as she thought, her brown hair tumbling over her shoulder in loose curls. “Probably not?”

Shiro turned back to the car, leaning in through the open window to grab the gum he left sitting on the passenger seat.

“Here you go then, Smoky,” he said, tossing it at her.

“Thanks. You want a cigarette, before we go in?”

“I quit.”

“Sure you did.”

“Stop being an enabler. Is your Dad here?”

“He went into town ten minutes ago. We’re out of wine.”

“Well,” Shiro said. “Can’t have that.”

Shiro’s mother was hovering in the doorway to the kitchen when they entered, a yellow apron tied over her pale blue dress, her feet bare against the floor. 

“Takashi, you didn’t take off your shoes,” Maria said, glancing down and frowning.

Ana laughed. She had already removed her flats. “Yeah Shiro, where are your manners?”

Shrio threw up his hands. “Is no one happy to see me? I might sort of get in trouble for coming here, you know.”

“Will you?” Maria asked, looking concerned now. She ushered him closer, brushing his hair away from his brow, dark eyes narrowing as she lowered her fingers to touch his cheek. 

“Are you eating enough?”

“Yes, Mom.”

“You look—”

“If anything I’ve put on weight—”

“Why are you getting in trouble?” Ana asked, moving around them to stand at the counter, reaching into the salad bowl and nabbing a slice of pepper before Maria could chide her. 

Shiro sat at the table and read them Matt’s messages. He had continued texting Shiro throughout his flight, describing in great detail the ebb and flow of the argument, the particular shade of red that rose to Iverson’s face when Sam told him he was overstepping. Renan arrived about halfway through, carrying a bottle of wine in one hand and a pie in the other. He placed a clumsy kiss against Maria’s hair before fishing out the corkscrew and pouring Shiro a glass as he spoke, not bothering to interrupt to ask if he wanted one.

“Hey Takashi,” he said afterwards, offering a sly smile along with the glass. Renan only ever called Shiro that when Maria was within hearing distance, otherwise opting to use the nickname Ana had given Shiro as a child when she couldn’t quite manage to pronounce _Takashi_. It was something Maria was perpetually bitter about, though she had allowed the matter to drop with Ana years ago. 

They had Feijoada for dinner with rice and fresh bread. Shiro didn’t mind the food at the garrison as much as some of the other cadets, though he couldn’t deny its tendency to be bland and mostly flavorless, served with the intent to be as filling and inoffensive as possible. But the stew reminded him immediately of what he’d been missing. It tasted hot and shockingly rich on his tongue, spicy from the added sausage. Shiro ate two bowls and half of another, picking at the heels of the bread long after he felt full.

“I knew they weren’t feeding you right!” Maria declared, tipping up her chin, teeth flashing as she smiled. Shiro laughed, but didn’t miss how quickly her humour faded when Ana made a comment about the all flash-freezed meals he’d be eating in the future.

Shiro shuddered, pushing back from the table so he could walk his dishes to the sink. “Ugh, don’t remind me.”

Maria joined him after a moment, offering to wash if he dried, ignoring Shiro when he said she didn’t have help. 

“Are you excited about the launch?” She asked. 

He glanced at her, but his mother’s eyes were directed down towards the cloth in her hand, the plate she was scrubbing at. Shiro couldn’t remember the last time she broached the topic of the mission. Even when she called to check in on him, her questions always revolved around his work in assisting the instructors, whether or not of he liked it, if he was happy.

She didn’t want him to go. Shiro knew it without having to be told, though he was unsure what to do with the knowledge and reluctant to bring it up. He hated how worried she was, but didn’t want her to feel guilty, either.

Shiro said, “Of course I am.”

Maria handed him a plate. “Nervous?”

Shiro turned the dish around beneath the towel in his hand, caught between admitting the truth and wanting to alleviate her concerns. 

“Maybe,” he said. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact it’s actually happening.”

Maria nodded, humming out a thoughtful sound but adding nothing more. Shiro turned the conversation around on her, asking about the new class she’d taken on, if the students were adjusting well. He brought up her garden and the book she was reading, questioned whether or not she and Renan were ever going to commit to painting the guest bedroom.

 _It’s okay,_ he didn’t tell her. _I’m coming back._

Her replies came quick and easy, but as soon as Shiro set the last spoon aside and turned she reached out to caught the sleeve of his shirt, wordlessly pulling him into a hug.

Shiro smiled, a small and sad little thing, pressing his cheek against the top of her head when Maria raised her hand to cup the back of his neck, suds still clinging to her fingers. 

“You okay, Mom?”

“I’m happy you’re home,” she said. It wasn’t really an answer, but Shiro didn’t mind, didn’t complain when the circle of her arms squeezed around him a little tighter.

Only—it didn’t stop. Her hold constricted around his ribs like a snake, fingernails digging in painfully at the base of his skull. Shiro blinked, and the brightness of the kitchen seemed to dim, soft light shifting to a deep, dark purple, white tiles greying beneath his feet. 

“Mom—” Shiro said, except, no, that wasn’t right— 

She lifted her face, yellow eyes flashing as her lips pulled back to reveal a row of sharp, white teeth.

“Champion,” Haggar crooned, drawing her hand down over his spine, her claws leaving a searing trail that cut through his shirt and along his skin. It was a disorienting, wicked blend of affection and hostility, and Shiro felt sick, unbalanced. Don’t touch me, _don’t touch me—_

Pain bloomed along his side, spreading through him like a stain. Shiro’s legs trembled, knees buckling, but Haggar kept him upright, laughing in his ear as she shifted her grip, digging her fingers deep into the open tear of his wound.

“It’s not too late,” she told him gently. “There’s still so much you can do for the Galra empire.”

Shiro shook his head, trying to twist away. There was a scream caught in his throat that refused to rise any further, and he was cold, _freezing_ , stuck in place. The walls were too close, pressing in around him, and distantly Shiro felt the sensation of something like glass beneath his fingers, unyielding and smooth as he scrabbled against it.

His thoughts swirled with panic, blood pounding in his ears. The light changed again, flashing into a wavering blue-white, and the image of Haggar flickered alongside it, dimming along the edges before sharpening back into focus. Shiro recoiled, overcome with the drive to get away, to get _out—_

 

\--

 

Pidge is still awake when the alarm goes off.

She’s sitting on the ground with her back against the couch, a laptop balanced on her bent knees. Hunk and Lance are asleep behind her, huddled up on the same cushion with Lance’s head tipped against the curve of Hunk’s shoulder, his chin tucked down towards his chest. 

Pidge hasn’t seen Keith for hours. 

He turned on his heel the moment after Shiro was placed inside the cryo-pod, fists clenched tightly at his sides, refusing to answer when Lance asked where he was going. His absence annoys her, all though Pidge isn’t certain why. Keith needs time to blow off some steam and would probably be insufferable if he was here now, anyways, stomping around and snapping at anyone daring enough to even try and offer anything resembling comfort. 

So Pidge is fine with being alone for awhile. Lance and Hunk will be awake in a few hours, when Keith comes back he’ll be more clear-headed and approachable, and Shiro should be fully healed by tomorrow. There’s nothing for Pidge to worry about, and she might as well get some work done, in the meantime. 

At least, in theory. Her fingers are stretched out over the keys of her computer, skittering back and forth between long pauses to tap out a string of numbers that is, inevitably, deleted not a moment after she’s ready to skip down to the next line of code. 

Wrong. 

It’s _wrong_ , but it’s not supposed to be. Pidge doesn’t do wrong. Not like this, anyways. There are things she doesn’t know, and sometimes there are miscalculations or overlooked data (that are always, _always_ hunted down and fixed, tagged with sticky-notes or the glaring sweep of a highlighter to remind her of just where she messed up), but she doesn’t make the same mistakes over and over again.

Her concentration is shot. If Lance or Hunk were awake, if Shiro or Keith were _there_ , they would tell her to go to sleep. Shiro had lectured her on that before, even got into the habit of hunting Pidge down in her lab hours after everyone else checked out for the night only to find her fiddling around with some new piece of tech or running scans on her computer.

“I’m _this_ close to just picking you up and carrying you out of here,” he threatened once, laughing at the look she gave him in response. He never actually tried it, though sometimes Shiro hung around for a couple of hours despite only ever seeming mildly interested in whatever Pidge was doing. 

It didn’t take her long to figure out that Shiro wasn’t very good at sleeping, either. 

Pidge jumps when a shrill ringing sounds overhead, clutching her laptop when it starts to slip. Lance wakes behind her with a jolt, his leg kicking out over her shoulder as he pushes away from Hunk. 

“What? What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Pidge says, pushing up her glasses so she can scrub at her eyes as she brings the castle’s systems up on screen. Hunk grumbles behind her, sitting up and leaning forward, reaching out to adjust the angle of her computer without asking. 

“There,” he says, pointing, leaving behind the smudge of a fingerprint that would infuriate Pidge under any other circumstance. “Something in the infirmary set it off.”

“Well let’s go then!” Lance says, pushing to his feet, grabbing the back of Pidge’s collar and hoisting her up with one hand as he scrambles for his jacket with the other.

They practically crash into Keith in the hallway. He rounds a corridor just as they’re passing by, stumbling over his own feet with his arms pin-wheeling outwards, only narrowly managing to step around Hunk instead of falling against him. 

“Oh, nice of you to join us.” Lance says. “How’s the gladiator?”

“I was with Red,” Keith snaps.

To Pidge’s surprise, Coran is waiting for them in the doorway to the infirmary, standing directly in their path with his hands up, his palms facing outwards in a placating gesture. 

“Easy now, Paladins,” he says. “There’s been a slight complication.”

Pidge tilts her head, peering beneath Coran’s outstretched arm. The active cryo-pod is open and empty, it’s control panel flashing a glaring shade of red cut through with altean letters she can’t comprehend. Shiro is hunched over on the floor, breathing raggedly with Allura crouched down in front of him, her hand hovering over the strong arch of his shoulders.

Lance bends his knees, ducking down to Pidge’s level so he can follow her line of sight.

“Complication?” Pidge says.

“ _Slight?_ ” Lance sputters.

“Wait.” Coran catches Keith’s shoulder when she tries to push by. “You mustn’t crowd him! Shiro was rejected by the cryo-pod and he’s still disoriented. He may not know where he is.”

Pidge frowns but heeds Coran’s warning, taking only a few cautious steps forward when he finally moves out of the way. If Shiro’s aware of their presence he doesn’t show it. His face is tipped downwards, lashes spiky and startlingly dark against the pallor of his skin. He may have looked sickly before when they dragged him out of the black lion, but this is something else entirely. His complexion has taken on a waxy look, with his bloodless cheeks and near-white lips, and there are violent tremors wracking through his body at uneven intervals, stuttering along the curved line of his spine and down his arms, making his jaw clench and teeth chatter.

Allura turns her head, glancing at them in brief show of acknowledgement before turning her attention back to Shiro. Pidge watches as she pulls in a slow breath, readying herself before softly fitting her hand against the open skin at the side of Shiro neck.

He flinches, and without warning Shiro’s left arm snaps up to strike her.

Lance and Hunk shout out in alarm, but Allura simply catches Shiro’s wrist, looking nothing more than mildly bemused. Firmly, she holds it in place, leaning in closer to say something too quiet for Pidge to hear, the movement of her lips veiled by the thick fall of her hair.

“He looks worst than he did before!” Keith says, rounding on Coran.

“Seriously, what’s going on?” Hunk asks, far more calm but with a telltale waver in his voice. “Nothing like this happened when Lance used the pod.”

Coran waves at a hovering stretcher sitting in the corner of the room, summoning it closer. “It’s possible that something’s interfering with the healing process.”

Pidge frowns. “Something like what?”

“Could be any number of different factors.”

“Shiro,” Allura says, her voice soft and clear. “Can you stand?”

Shiro doesn’t answer at first, and only shakes his head slowly when Allura repeats the question.

“That’s fine,” Allura says. I’ll help you.” 

Allura takes Shiro’s arm and pulls it over her shoulder, lifting him to his feet as she straightens her knees, standing graciously beneath his weight.

Pidge blinks, her mind set in motion with a burst of curiosity —just how strong is Allura? She stopped Shiro’s blow like it was nothing, and even as he is now he can’t be that weak. Is she increasing her muscle mass with her transformative abilities? Which, hey, can Coran change his appearance too? He hasn’t yet, but that doesn’t mean—

It’s then, that she notices the blood.

The material of the soft-suit is surprisingly thick and hides the colour well, but some of it has dripped onto the floor, shines wetly off the edges of Allura’s fingers where they’re gripped around his waist. 

“Pidge. Hey, come here.” Lance loops an arm around Pidge’s collarbone, pulling her a step back so she bumps into his chest. It’s the kind of thing that should bother Pidge more than it does. She’s not a child and Lance isn’t her brother. She doesn’t need him to comfort her.

But Lance’s hand is shaking a little against her shoulder, and Pidge knows that on some level the gesture is meant to make him feel better as much as her. He isn’t trying to be condescending, doesn’t intend to toe at a line Pidge would rather not have crossed, so she swallows her words and leaves it alone. 

Shiro’s laid out on the table, his head lolling listlessly to the side as if he’s still asleep. Coran cuts through the top of his soft-suit, pulling it away in pieces, and Pidge feels Lance grow suddenly tense behind her, hears the quiet pained noise Hunk makes at her side. 

The scars don’t surprise Pidge, but she lowers her eyes and ducks her head, tries to smother down the part of her brain that’s already buzzing with analytics, pointing out which marks were most likely left by blade and which could have only been made by the blast of a laser. There’s a strange, mangled patch of skin near Shiro’s shoulder that almost resembles a burn, a curved line of puncture wounds along his ribs where something with long teeth dug in and—

Pidge trembles, reaching up to wrap her fingers around Lance’s arm. 

She doesn’t want to know. She doesn’t want to think about it.

“His stitches are gone,” Keith says.

“The—ah, yes, _stitches,_ were they?” Coran frowns, rolling the word over in his mouth. “The pod would have dissolved them.”

Hunk glances down at the drops of blood spattered along the floor. “Um, okay. Why?”

“Well to heal him, of course!”

“Yeah,” Lance says. “Because that’s going well.”

“Coran, we need a scanner,” Allura cuts in. She steps away from the stretcher, wiping her hands before pulling her hair up and away from her face, twisting it into a knot. When she moves back towards Shiro she brings a thick pad of gauze with her, gently dabbing it along the edges of the wound, soaking up the blood for a better look.

Shiro stirs at the contact, groaning low in his throat, a slight wince forming around his eyes.

“Hey,” Keith says. He moves closer, fingertips barely skimming over Shiro’s arm. “Shiro?”

“It’s cold,” Shiro says, all though he’s not shaking anymore.

“A side effect of being rejected by the pod,” Coran explains. He reaches over with the scanner, holding it just above the wound and flicking his free hand to bring up a holographic visual. The image is not overtly different form what Pidge would expect to see on a monitor back on earth, vague shapes outlined in a ring of colour she’s no fully sure how to interpret. 

“There,” Allura says. “Do you see that?”

Coran hums, selecting a portion of the image and pinching his fingers to enhance it, narrowing in on the one bright speck that can be seen against the otherwise dark background. 

“What is that?” Hunk asks, leaning in.

“Not sure,” Coran says, his tone deceptively light. “I suppose we’ll see when we remove it.”

“Um. Is this something Shiro has to be awake for, or…?”

Shiro blinks, slow and sleepy, his brows pulling in, and Pidge can practically _see_ the effort it takes for him to try and comprehend what’s happening, slotting the words and implications carefully into place.

“Don’t,” Shiro says. “Don’t put me out.”

Unwittingly, Pidge thinks of a choppy video feed, of Shiro shouting wildly at the garrison’s scientists, fighting against the restraints crossed over his chest.

Allura hesitates. “Shiro—”

“No.” Shiro lifts his head, his voice steady, uncompromising, grey eyes sharpening with intent. “I’m saying no. I don’t want that.”

“What about a painkiller?” Lance asks. “Do you have those?”

“We can numb the area,” Coran offers, glancing warily at Shiro. “But—”

“That’s fine,” Shiro says. The strength he managed to gather seems to fade all at once, his eyes drifting shut the moment after he settles back down.

Allura spreads a clear gel along the edge of each gash, watching Shiro carefully as she works. She pinches him, afterwards, and nods to Coran when Shiro provides no reaction. 

A deep breath, and then Coran is pressing a pair of forceps into the open wound, his gaze flittering back and forth between the holograph and the task at hand. Shiro’s eyes remain close, and for a moment Pidge thinks the Altean medicine has worked, before she notices the sweat that’s begun to bead along his brow, the hard, trembling line of his jaw.

“You’re hurting him,” she says, quietly.

Allura stiffens, but doesn’t turn to her. “We’re almost there. Coran, go straight down and you should hit it.” 

Coran adjusts the angle of the instrument, pressing harder. Shiro doesn’t make a sound, but his prosthetic hums, activating with a flash of light so bright it leaves an afterimage burning behind Pidge’s eyes.

Coran stills, his fingertips whitening against the end of the forceps.

“Shiro.”

“Sorry,” Shiro gasps, his voice strained. The light flickers. “Sorry, I—.”

Keith makes a frustrated sound, his grip tightening on Shiro’s arm. “Don’t apologize.”

“I believe I have it,” Coran says. “But I’ll have to pull back slowly, Shiro, or it will slip.”

“Fine, that’s fine, just…”

And that’s when it happens. 

There’s an audible _click_ that makes Pidge raise her head, frowning, and whatever’s caught beneath Shiro’s skin begins to glow, emitting a bright, violet light that illuminates Shiro’s veins and highlights the creeping-vine pattern spreading out from the edges of the wound. 

Shiro chokes, his breath catching in his chest, and Pidge sees it: the moment that Shiro that stops knowing where he is, that he forgets he’s still safe.

He tries to sit up, his prosthetic buzzing with energy as it rises from the surface of the table. Lance let’s go of Pidge, calling out, but Keith is already pushing Shiro back down and Hunk is there, too, leaning over Shiro’s head and placing both his hands on his shoulders, urging him to lie flat.

“Whoa, hey, easy man,” he says, smiling at Shiro like nothing’s wrong, a weak string of laughter unfolding behind his voice. “We’re almost done, okay? Just hang in there.”

“Hunk?” Shiro croaks. He seems almost more disoriented than before, his gaze cloudy and unfocused. 

“Yeah, hi. We’re at the castle. Allura and Coran are patching you up. Keith’s here too, and so are Lance and Pidge, they’re just hanging back a little.”

Shiro blinks, his eyes skittering about, pausing only for a moment when they land on Keith. 

“You’re okay,” Keith says. He shifts his grip on Shiro’s arm, fitting their palms together instead.

Pidge grabs the front of Lance’s shirt and moves closer.

“Just about done Shiro,” she says, forcing a smile. Shiro looks at her and Lance in turn, and it takes a worryingly long moment before he seems satisfied with their presence.

“Something’s wrong,” he says.

“Nah, we’re good,” Lance says, waving his hand dismissively. “We… are good, right?”

“Fine!” Allura says, her voice pitched a little too high.

“Yeah, see? Oh, and Shiro, did you know Hunk brought back all this fruit with him from the planet he was stranded on?”

Keith snorts. “How would Shiro— wait, he did?” 

“Yeah man, the locals were all about it.” Hunk shrugs. “Doesn’t really taste all that earth-y, but whatever.”

“Can we make smoothies?” Pidge asks. Shiro cants his head slightly, frowning at them. Pidge isn’t sure how well he’s following along, but notices that the light from his prosthetic has dimmed.

“Ooh, yeah. Good call, Pidge.”

They chatter on like that for just a little while longer, and Pidge has to actively resist turning around the entire time to see what Coran and Allura are doing. But it’s worth it, when Shiro slowly begins to relax, when he stops looking at them as though they’re liable to vanish if he just so much as blinks. The edge of his mouth quirks upwards when Lance starts whining on about milkshakes, a small smile that’s almost immediately overshadowed by a flinch Shiro can’t quite manage to hide.

“There,” Coran says.

Pidge can’t stop herself. She looks over just as Coran holds the forceps up to the light, and to her eyes it appears as though he’s abstracted nothing more than a small chunk of glass, the faint purple aura surrounding it already dissipating into the open air like a wisp of smoke.

“What is that?”

Shiro lifts his head, studying the object for a long moment before a little puff of air escapes his lips. It sounds almost like a laugh, and is like nothing Pidge has ever heard from him before.

“A claw,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In regards to Shiro's family: I headcanon Shiro as being Japanese-Brazilian. Shiro's father died while he was still very young, so he has little to no memory of him. A few years after his death Shiro's mother moved them back to Brazil where she met and became romantically involved with Renan. Renan had an infant daughter of his own, named Ana. While Maria and Renan never married they eventually bought a house together and remain in a long-term relationship, and despite Shiro considering Ana his sister he doesn't really think of Renan as his dad, though he's still family and Shiro likes and loves him very much. 
> 
> This dynamic something I've explored a little more eloquently in my other fic, [this decay, this hope, this mouthful of dirt](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9216746), which yes I am just shamelessly tossing out right here.
> 
> As always, you can find me on [tumblr](http://lightshesaid.tumblr.com/) if you feel like wandering over to scream about Voltron with someone.


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